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The company had invited a consultant to review its workers because the work atmosphere had deteriorated to a degree that the workers were leaving and the customers were already beginning to notice it.
After observing how people worked and having talked to many salespersons the consultant invited them all into the conference room. He looked at the people in front of him and said:
– You remind me of a bedtime story my own mother used to tell me. It was a story of a father and his sons who kept quarrelling with each other no matter what the father did or said. So he decided that because they were not listening to his words, he would show them in a practical way how they were hurting themselves with their negative attitude.
He asked the sons to bring him a bundle of sticks. The father put the big bundle in their hands and asked them to break it.
No matter how hard they tried, the bundle did not break. Then the father opened the bundle and gave each of his sons a separate stick and asked them to try again. This time the sticks broke easily.
The father then said; “Think that you are like these sticks. If you stick together and assist one another, you are like a thick bundle of sticks that others cannot break. But if you are divided and separated from each other, you can be broken as easily as these sticks.”
The consultant continued:
– You may think negative attitude isn’t hurting you, but it causes your co-workers to leave their jobs. They spread the word of how they were treated.
It is in your best interest to start working together. If you cannot stop talking bad things about people behind their backs, just be certain you shall meet your own deeds in the future. You see: if you talk bad things about someone behind their back, everyone will realize you will probably do the same about them. No surprise then that they do not wish to work or be with you.

REFLECTION: If you have a negative attitude, may be you should make yourself a little bundle of sticks and keep it on your desk to remind yourself of the value of team work

One evening a man took a small candle from a box and began to climb a long winding stairway. “Where are we going?” asked the candle. “We’re going up higher than a house to show the ships the way to the harbour.”
“But no ship in the harbour could ever see my light,” the candle said, “it is so very small.”
“If your light is small,” the man said, “just keep on burning brightly and leave the rest to me.”
When they reached the top of the long stairs, they came to a large lamp. Then he took the little candle and lit the lamp. Soon the large polished mirrors behind the lamp sent beams of fight out across miles of sea.

REFLECTION: In the Master’s Plan we are His candles! Our job is to keep on shining. The success of our work is in His hands. A tiny candle or match can start a forest fire. The little flame of your good example can actually change the lives of others without you knowing it. Be a light to them like the beacon light in the story which guide the ship to safe harbour.

A woman named Mary Ann Bird tells her story: “I grew up knowing that I was different, and I hated it. 1 was born with a cleft palate, and when I started school, my classmates made it clear to me how I must look to others: a little girl with a misshapen lip, crooked nose, lopsided teeth and garbled speech.

When my schoolmates would ask, ‘What happened to your lip?’ I’d tell them I’d fallen and cut it on a piece of glass. Somehow it seemed more acceptable to have suffered an
accident than to have been born different. I was convinced that no one outside my family could love me.

“There was, however, a teacher in the second grade that we all adored, Mrs. Leonard by name. She was a short, round, happy, sparkling lady.

Annually, we would have a hearing test. Mrs. Leonard gave the test to everyone in the class, and finally it was my turn. I knew from past years that as we stood against the door and covered one ear, the teacher sitting at her desk would whisper something and we would have to repeat it back. .. things like ‘The sky is blue’ or ‘Do you have new shoes?’ 1 waited there for those words which God must have put into her mouth, those seven words which changed my life.

Reflection: Being accepted and appreciated in spite of her physical defect by her kindly teacher changed her whole life for Mary Ann Bird. A little kindness on our part many a time can make a world of difference for someone.

There was once a young man who was afraid of everyone and everything: of cars, of the darkness, of people and animals, and of the likes of you and me. But he wanted to be brave. So one day he went away to learn how to overcome his fear.

First he visited a pilot who was used to making long flights across the ocean. “A person doing something like that, surely can have no fear,” the boy said to himself. And so he asked the pilot, “Are you ever afraid?”

The pilot nodded his head and said, “Oh, yes. Sometimes I’m afraid that my radar will break down when I’m flying in the fog and I might end up against a mountain top. And sometimes I’m also afraid that someone might hide a bomb in my plane. Sometimes I also get afraid that I might get a heart attack while flying. And sometimes I just get
afraid and don’t know why.”

“What do you do about these different fears?” the lad wanted to know.

The pilot answered, “I just fly the best I can. I am careful, but I leave it at that; and just continue with my job.”

Then the boy went to see a racing car driver. He had driven on tracks where many another racer had been hurt. The boy asked him, “Do you ever get afraid?”

“Oh, yes,” he answered. “I fear that I might be carried off the track on a stretcher and my car will roll over and catch on fire. I am also afraid that I might collide with another car and both us drivers could be handicapped for life. I also fear the day when I’ll no longer be able to win …. and sometimes I’m afraid and don’t know why.”

At that the young man asked, “And what do you do in a case like that?”

The driver answered, “Well, I do everything to the best of my ability, and just keep on going.”

Once a group of Chinese students asked their wise old teacher why he would sometimes just stand at the river’s edge for a longer time and stare at the water. What did he see there?

He did not immediately answer. Nor did he look away from the continuously flowing stream. Finally he spoke up, “Flowing water teaches us how to live: “Wherever it flows it brings life and shares itself with everyone who needs it. A river is kind and generous.”

“It knows how to level off the unevenness of the landscape. It is just and fair. It throws itself over cliffs into the depths of the valley without even slowing down. It is courageous.”

“Its surface is flat and smooth, but underneath it can hide churning currents. A river is wise.”

“It flows around rocks that hinder its progress. A river is tolerant. But at the same time it works day and night to get that hindrance out of its way. A river is tireless No matter how many windings and detours it must make, it never loses sight of its goal: the sea. A river is single-minded. A river is able to keep renewing itself.”

“These are my reasons for staring at the flowing river. It teaches me to live correctly.”
_ Johannes Thiele

Doing God’s Will is what is on my mind. Holiness consists in doing God’s will. To DO God’s will one needs to KNOW God’s will. All that is required to know God’s will is to have a well-formed conscience based on basic human rights and values, and union with God. To use a metaphor of Christ, branches apart from a tree cannot live and bear fruits. God is that tree and we are the branches. We are in union with God when we are truly altruistic and live for others.Then we are connected to God as branches to a tree. Our CONSCIENCE that clearly tells us what is right and wrong, and our UNION with God will reveal God’s will for us.
To simplify matters even further, we may also understand union with God as faithfulness to our own conscience that represents God’s voice within us.The Golden Rule that, Christ said, sums up the Scriptures, namely, DOING FOR OTHERS WHAT WE WANT THEM TO DO FOR US, confirms also God’s will for us in our daily life. Slowly nearing the brink of ecologic disaster, these days we are required to reverse that trend, and preserve and enhance God’s creation as an important aspect of God’s will. Additionally, any kind of ADDICTION to alcohol, nicotine, sex, any substance, inordinate affection that spiritually or physically harms us and dehumanizes us, renders us less capable of doing God’s will. The consumeristic, market economy – this world – that makes us objects and goods for others, solely catering to the indulgence of our senses, is hostile to God.
In other words, knowing God’s will is simple for a detached, spiritual person; but doing God’s will is very difficult for an undisciplined person without a strong will.